


house hunting.

by shortbreadd



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Coming Out, Fluff, M/M, This is entirely crack, inspired by smol-andrew-minyard's post on tumblr
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-06
Updated: 2019-04-06
Packaged: 2020-01-05 19:43:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18372797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shortbreadd/pseuds/shortbreadd
Summary: Neil was silently giggling at some stupid show on the TV, until Andrew couldn’t stand it and popped Neil upside the head. He looked to see just what was on the screen to make Neil laugh so hard, and his eyebrows popped up as he watched a blond woman happily proclaim, “You can sign up at www.househunters/signup.com for a chance to appear on the show!”Neil’s shoulders shook harder at that, and no matter what Andrew told himself, his chest still warmed a little at the sight.After the program had ended, Neil wriggled on the couch so his head was resting on Andrew’s lap, and once a few moments had passed, he raised his hands and whispered, ”I want to sign up,”Andrew only shrugged and responded, “I don’t care what you do. I’m not your keeper,”But Neil shook his head, and looked imploringly up at Andrew’s face. He looked pathetic, with his eyes wide, and bottom lip extended in a pout, but Andrew’s heart skipped a beat.He sighed and said, “Fine.” It was worth it to watch Neil’s face light up, and tug his computer close. Andrew watched, motionless as Neil put in their names, and Andrew’s phone number.Or: Neil and Andrew come out via househunters





	house hunting.

Neil was silently giggling at some stupid show on the TV, until Andrew couldn’t stand it and popped Neil upside the head. He looked to see just what was on the screen to make Neil laugh so hard, and his eyebrows popped up as he watched a blond woman happily proclaim, “You can sign up at www.househunters/signup.com for a chance to appear on the show!”

Neil’s shoulders shook harder at that, and no matter what Andrew told himself, his chest still warmed a little at the sight.

After the program had ended, Neil wriggled on the couch so his head was resting on Andrew’s lap, and once a few moments had passed, he raised his hands and whispered, ”I want to sign up,”

Andrew only shrugged and responded, “I don’t care what you do. I’m not your keeper,”

But Neil shook his head, and looked imploringly up at Andrew’s face. He looked pathetic, with his eyes wide, and bottom lip extended in a pout, but Andrew’s heart skipped a beat.

He sighed and said, “Fine.” It was worth it to watch Neil’s face light up, and tug his computer close. Andrew watched, motionless as Neil put in their names, and Andrew’s phone number.

He would have questioned Neil’s choice in numbers, except Andrew knew that Neil hardly ever used or charged his phone. Neil pressed enter, then shoved the computer onto the carpeted floor and lay back into Andrew’s lap, eyes closed. And then Andrew let himself go to sleep.

Andrew was walking down the icy sidewalk, when his phone buzzed and he saw an unknown caller. He would have hung up, but it might have been Neil, stuck in the sudden blizzard without his phone, calling from a payphone. So he picked up, and immediately regretted it when a cheerful voice practically screamed in his ear, “Hello! My name is Becky, and you’ll be happy to know that you’ve been picked for House Hunters! If you could please come to _______ at 6:00 p.m. today, you’ll be given a plan on filming, House Hunters!”

Before Andrew could respond, the line went dead and he stood, staring at his screen. He considered not telling Neil about the sudden call, but he somehow knew that Neil would find out anyway. He always seemed to know if Andrew wasn’t telling him something.

Andrew headed home, shook off his wet coat and boots, and fell straight

onto the warm couch. He fell asleep there, but woke when he heard the front door open up. He immediately had a knife out, poised to throw, but it was only Neil coming in from practice.

Andrew relaxed, and put the knife away while Neil shucked off his gloves. “We have somewhere to be at 6:00,” He called out, and Neil nodded.

Andrew was about two minutes away from pulling out a knife from his armbands impaling the stupid spokesperson with it. The woman just would not stop giggling and winking and most of all, touching Neil. Andrew watched, stone-faced as Neil made a small joke, and the woman practically exploded with laughter, then proceeded to put her manicured nails on a supremely confused looking Neil.

The hand stayed on Neil’s shoulder for almost five minutes, before Andrew became impatient and pulled Neil back a little, dropping the woman’s hand awkwardly between them. She stared a little, before continuing on to talk about recording times, as if that really mattered. Andrew channeled all of his patience into standing still while the woman edged closer and closer to Neil, and resisted the urge to take out a cigarette.

Doing this stupid show with Neil so it’d make him happy was one thing, but dealing with a stupid host who didn’t know how to keep her hands to herself? That was not what Andrew had signed up for. Well, technically Neil had signed them both up, but he had still agreed.

After almost forty-five minutes of dealing with Neil’s oblivious stares and the woman’s shrewd sneaky glances, Andrew couldn’t take it anymore and slipped off to the bathroom.

He spent thirty minutes in the largest stall, smoking because the people hadn’t deigned to put in a smoke detector. Andrew would admit that he had run off to smoke, but anybody in his situation would have.

He was still trying to convince himself that he wasn’t being cowardly by leaving Neil with the woman, when the door swung open and Neil started to knock on Andrew’s stall door, hard.

He emerged to an angry glare from Neil’s face. Andrew had barely started to come out when Neil’s voice burst out.

“Why did you just leave me there? You knew I didn’t want to deal with the weird lady, she kept giving me weird looks and touching my arm. She was talking about some sort of schedule? And then you went off and left me alone and-” Neil’s voice cut off abruptly. “Are you smoking in here?”

Andrew took that moment to exhale smoke in Neil’s face, which he waved away. Neil’s face crumpled down from rage to tiredness, and Andrew felt a little bad for leaving Neil to deal with the handsy spokesperson.

He tugged Neil back into the stall and didn’t bother to lock the door, before breathing out a “Yes or no?”

When Neil said yes, Andrew pulled Neil to him, pressing himself into the wall, before leaning up to kiss him.

Neil’s lips were warm and Andrew felt a heat curling through his entire body. Eventually, Andrew pulled up his legs and wrapped them around Neil’s waist, and felt him smile against Andrew’s mouth.

They stayed like that for almost half-an-hour, Neil holding Andrew up, and Andrew letting Neil support him.

Unfortunately though, good things weren’t meant to last long, especially with somebody like Andrew. A tiny squeak sounded from behind Neil’s back, and he turned to see the woman from earlier, staring in blind shock at the two of them pressed together.

“I-I’m sorry, I just wanted to go to the bathroom, but I-uh, I’ll leave you to it!” The woman rushed into the farthest stall, and when Neil looked back at Andrew, he was unable to keep the giggles from escaping.

Andrew had decided that he was tired of laughing and never wanted to hear it again earlier with the woman, but he watched Neil giggle and smile, and decided it was untrue.

He could put up with a little more of this stupid show just to see Neil laugh. Andrew though it was a treasure worth more than the money they were receiving. 

Cassy was just trying to enjoy some mind-numbing interior decorating shows when she came across a new episode of House Hunters. She clicked on it, but instead of some sort of generic, white heterosexual couple on the cover, there were two very short men with sullen expressions.

Huh.

Cassy clicked play, and watched the two short men appeared on the screen, literally just standing immobile in front of some sort of muddy lake, said in a totally monotonous and boring voice, “Hello. I’m Neil Josten, professional Exy player on the Colorado Lions,”

“And I’m Andrew Minyard, freelance murderer and professional Exy player,”

“Together, our budget is two million dollars.”

Cassy gaped for a moment while the voice-over started saying some shit about how the two of them needed to find a home, but eventually she snapped out of it and called out, “Babe! You know those two Exy players you like? Andrew Minyard and Neil Josten?”

“Yeah, why?”

“Well they just appeared on the House Hunters show and they said they’ve been married for two years!”

“What?!” A yelp came from Cassy’s girlfriend, Kylie came from the general direction of the kitchen, and soon Kylie was slipping over her socked feet on the wooden floors to get to the TV.

She stared, shocked as the host, Kelly or something, said in a bright voice, “So, is it the first time you two are looking for a house together?”

“Yes, we’ve been homeless our entire lives. We’ve heard lots of good things about living in houses.” Andrew Minyard’s bored voice interrupted. A nervous giggle came from the Host, wait no, Kelly, and Cassy suppressed the urge to giggle.

Kylie’s voice distracted Cassy from the TV. “I knew it! All of the other fans said that I was crazy, and it was stupid, but I was right! Andrew and Neil are actually married!” Kylie collapsed into the couch, and Cassy hugged her middle.

“Babe, I think you’re in shock. Do you want some water?” Kylie shook her head slowly, her eyes glued to the screen. Cassy almost laughed, and turned up the volume. On the screen, Kelly was clearly struggling to keep the conversation afloat while Neil Josten offered up distanced one-word answers, and Andrew didn’t say anything at all.

Kelly was trying to recommend some middle-class two story homes, until Andrew interrupted her yet again, and chimed in. “You know, we have an absurdly large budget, thanks to our non-existent exy skills, so can you just pick out some house that the president used to live in or whatever the fuck you want?”

Cassy snorted at the beep from Andrew’s haphazard cussing, and left Kylie to enjoy her show.

Cassy came back in right as the show was coming to a conclusion. On screen, Neil was smiling for what was probably the first time on the show, and announced, “Thanks Kelly, but I don’t think any of these options are perfect for us. We like a minimalist style, which is why we chose this house!” Cassy watched as the camera cut to what looked to be one tiny room with a stove, a microwave, and a tiny sink.

Neil started to voice the monologue about how this house was perfect for both of them, seeing as they were both very small, but Cassy wasn’t listening. What she was paying attention to was how outrageously small the house was. It looked even smaller than her college dorm room, which was saying a lot.

Andrew on camera, started to pull open the various cabinets, the lowest one on the ground being an extendable bed slash couch, and a tiny compartment connecting to the room was the shower and toilet. He was naming each of the appliances, but Cassy was close to bursting out with laughter at how many beeps there were.

Cassy watched until the credits rolled with Kylie, then laughed and hugged her goofy Exy-obsessed girlfriend. Life was good.

“What the fuck do you mean, we have to live here?” Andrew asked incredulously. Neil snorted, and spread his arms out in the tiny space that was now their home. “Well, there’s a reason we were on house hunters. We found a house, so now we’re going to live in it,”

Andrew was unimpressed. “Return this house immediately. I’m going home.” Andrew started to walk out, but the guilty look on Neil’s face stopped him. “What did you do.”

Neil bit his lip, and sighed. “I, uh, sold our old house to live in this one?” Andrew’s eyes grew inflamed with pure rage.

“Where is our stuff then?” Andrew demanded. Neil pointed to the top drawer that Andrew couldn’t even reach, then slid out the drawer and got out three duffle bags full of stuff. Andrew started to stalk off to the door, but Neil shouted, “Wait! Don’t leave, I got you ice-cream!”

Andrew paused at that, then with slow, angry steps, stomped to the small fridge, then got out a tub of strawberry ice cream.

“Do we even have a fucking TV?” He challenged. Neil nodded, and reached out for a random button. Once he pressed it, a part of the wall slid out, revealing an expensive looking TV that was probably worth at least a thousand dollars more than the old one they’d had. Andrew only sighed, and switched channels until he found a mildly entertaining talk show.

>>

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, Andrew. I just wanted to know what it felt like. I actually have a future to look forward to, and I wanted to try everything. I just-” Andrew pressed his finger to Neil’s lips and sighed.

“Do whatever you want. This doesn’t change anything between us. At least you tricked it out a little.” Neil smiled, and even through the darkness, it was bright. Andrew tamped down the warm feeling in his chest and leaned in close. “Yes or no?” He asked.

“Yes. I hope you like this, Andrew.” Andrew only shook his head and replaced his finger on Neil’s lips with his own, and the two of them kissed in the darkness until they both fell sound asleep in their new home.


End file.
